


the eyes of the divine

by PikaCheeka



Series: until the stars die [2]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Angst, M/M, Rape/Non-con Elements, fast burn romance, takes place in canon verse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-07-08 19:19:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15936662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PikaCheeka/pseuds/PikaCheeka
Summary: Ardyn Izunia tells a thousand lies.Ignis Scientia only needs to believe one.-The depths of Ardyn’s knowledge are unfathomable, as if he’d lived a thousand lifetimes in the time it takes one to draw breath. His knowledge far exceeds that of any tutor, any scholar or professor, that Ignis has had the opportunity to meet, and he has met the greatest minds in the nation. And what he does know. So much rare knowledge, ancient lore and forgotten spells and the languages necessary to study them. Ignis had always been frustrated with those who didn’t know how to maneuver around his ambition, his intellect, his determination to become General to the King, who only ever held him back. ButArdyn, Ardyn offers the world. Ignis finds himself reaching towards him, fingers trembling as he presses into the older man’s coats and feels those arms fold around him.Teach me. Teach me everything you know and I will be yours.-Standalone and companion piece to “until the stars die”.





	the eyes of the divine

**Author's Note:**

> First and foremost, thank you SO much to all who commented, bookmarked, and kudos-ed my first fic. That was a very warm welcome to a new fandom for me. I received a few requests for this companion piece to “until the stars die” (though this works as a stand-alone), so here it is. The two fics tell two sides of the same story – while the first was Ardyn’s, this one belongs to Ignis. They complement and complete one another, but the entire story can be grasped by only reading one or the other. Please note that tone and writing style are intentionally a bit different due to the different perspective; Ignis is not quite as intense as Ardyn (but I will write more Ardyn soon)! This one ended up quite long; I had hoped they would be about the same length, but to portray Ignis' tension between self and duty, I had to offer some extra scenes. A friend read my first fic and described Ignis as "unfortunately sincere", so I had some fun with that (poor Ignis). I hope this meets expectations of a companion piece and you enjoy it!

 

There is something practiced in his disheveled appearance, something that at first glance shook Ignis with unease to his very core but has since grown alluring. _You intrigue me._ It had been hard to resist such a daring claim.

 _Ardyn_. He’d said his name was Ardyn, a strange one if Ignis had ever heard, oddly archaic, as if he were the offspring of scholars. Which wouldn’t surprise Ignis in the least, given his attire and habits of speech. Highly educated, cultured, if not remarkably lacking in manners. It’s an unexpectedly appealing juxtaposition, and Ignis is lured in within seconds, hopelessly under his thrall within minutes.

Ardyn, who is now loudly lamenting the lack of _true_ antique bookstores in town after walking into the second they’d seen only to find nothing less than twenty years old. Ignis had initially been startled at how easily Ardyn criticized anything and everything he laid eyes on, as if he had no interest in impressing him and was laying himself and all his inequities before him for Ignis to weigh. After years of royal courts, this honesty is appreciated.

“You’re insufferable,” he finally cuts him off mid-sentence. Ardyn didn’t seem to breathe between them, and Ignis was already learning that interruption was a necessity.

He flings his arms wide in response. “And yet here we are, enjoying this lovely evening together. I must have _some_ redeeming qualities, though I can’t recall what they may be.”

There’s a lot he _can_ say to this, but nothing he _should_ say. He hopes the smirk he gives the older man and the ease in which he points to the next window is enough. “Might we stop in here?”

He arches one eyebrow and looks down his nose at him. “A junk shop? Are you trying to get rid of me?”

But he’s already opening the shop door for him, making a grand sweep and a bow as he does so. And just as Ignis passes him, he touches him, a light glance on the small of his back as he gently pushes him through the entrance. Just enough to make the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, and he glances at the older man before he can stop himself. _The cut of his jaw…_ Ignis catches himself thinking, and he leans sharply away, feeling heat rise to his cheeks. Because this man is attractive, dangerously so, and Ignis feels as if he is being engulfed in something he can’t quite understand. He lingers in the automotive aisle, but he can’t focus on anything but the scent of Ardyn’s cologne, intoxicating and expensive, and so he pushes onwards, back into the street and onto the next shop.

Ardyn talks a lot, perhaps a little too much, but he clearly doesn’t expect a response to everything he says and doesn’t seem to even notice that Ignis is too distracted to catch more than every other word. Probably used to rambling on to himself. Because he’s a little eccentric, a little flamboyant, a little dangerous, and therefore probably very much the loner. Ignis leans into the next touch, when Ardyn gently brushes fingers against his arm to get his attention. _I hope._

The sense of drowning deepens when they are admiring a display of blades, Ardyn’s fingers tapping on the glass counter while he makes small talk with the increasingly unnerved cashier. Ignis can _feel_ those hands on him, running down his torso and ass and thighs, and as he watches Ardyn speak, he hears no words but only stares at the curl in the corners of his lips, the easy smile he has that is somehow obscene. He stares at those teeth and wonders at the thought of them scraping his skin. He wonders what it would be like to kiss him, to run his lips over that stubbled square jaw and lean into those arms he can only guess at. He’s powerful, he can tell that much; he can see his weight in his saunter and his strength in how _easy_ everything is for him. He finds himself frustrated at how many layers Ardyn wears, at the hood that shrouds the shoulders he wants to grasp and the coat that masks the hips he wants to wrap his legs around. He can’t see enough, and Ardyn becomes all the more appealing for his mystery.

It’s a savage awakening, and he suddenly knows what he wants and just how he wants it and he knows if he doesn’t ask now, the chance will be gone forever and he’ll be left with such a hunger he won’t be able to survive.

He grabs the older man’s sleeve, tugs on him as he comes to a standstill behind him.

“You don’t have to be so discreet,” he all but whispers. And by the way Ardyn’s eyes widen in surprise, he knows he will have his way. 

-

He’s shaking when they check into the hotel, and he finds he can’t meet the hotel clerk’s eyes. He can’t watch Ardyn’s hands as he counts out the gil either, those _hands_ , and so he nervously stares at the floor. His own hands are sweating and he’s thankful he’s still wearing his gloves as he opens and closes his fingers. _I won’t be wearing them for long. Or anything._ _I said yes. I said yes when a man I’d just met kissed me in an alley and asked if I’d like to go to a hotel with him._ He’s shocked at his own daring.

Ardyn is on him the moment the door is closed, and he doesn’t have time to reconsider, doesn’t let himself have time to reconsider, as he stumbles backwards onto the bed and drags the older man down on top of him. He’s rough, relentless and unforgiving as he kisses Ignis, bites his way down his throat and runs his hands all over his body, but he also purrs in satisfaction at every moan, every time Ignis flinches when a nail scrapes over a nipple through his shirt or a palm digs into his erection. It’s all Ignis can do to keep up, all he can do to not drown in his awareness of Ardyn’s weight, the strength in his calloused hands, the scrape of his stubble against his cheeks, his low growls of desire, his heavy erection against his thigh, because in all of his depraved fantasies, he could never fully imagine what it was like to have another man taking control of him. He scarcely notices when Ardyn pulls his gloves off, unbuckles his belt and rips his pants down a few inches.

“Ah, look at that,” he whispers, and it takes Ignis a moment to realize what he’s looking at. The spot of dampness on his boxer briefs. He whines softly, at once surprised and ashamed that he’s already leaking so much, and compulsively pushes Ardyn back as he sits up.

"Sorry, sorry, I'm already..." he breaks off in a shuddering gasp as the older man rubs a finger over him. He's already dangerously close to orgasm and terrified of showing his inexperience so early. If this is what sex is he isn’t sure he can handle it.

"Don't apologize for anything tonight.” Ardyn sits on his heels as he speaks, calmly shedding his coat and scarves, his vest. He pauses there, only to gently, _so gently_ ease off Ignis’ jacket and unbutton his shirt. “Down again. Relax.”

He isn't used to being told to relax. _Remarkably difficult to do._ His fingers twist in the sheets as he lifts his hips up and tries to still the trembling in his thighs. Ardyn slips his pants and briefs down and off, caressing his calves as he does. And Ardyn _sighs_ when he sees him, and there is something in his eyes that makes Ignis shudder. Hunger.

"You have no idea how attractive you are, do you?"

“I’ve never done this,” he blurts out, shamefully aware of this fact and anxious that his body will betray him a thousand times before the night is out. But the older man doesn’t seem to mind the response, nor the fact that Ignis’ words do not answer his question.

He only cocks his head to the side and runs a finger up his chest. "Well, we ought to make it a night to remember then, hm? What would you like to do first?"

"Sex," he says it quickly, sharply, before he can change his mind. His dick twitches as he says the word and he winces.

"Uhm," he clicks his tongue and smirks. It's an attractive smirk, but something about it seems ever so slightly maladjusted. "That's why we're here, is it not? I meant would you like my mouth first or...?”

 _His mouth._ He reflexively closes his legs. “Sex first. Mouth after. If you want.” He’s stammering, unschooled and unhinged. So unprofessional. And then he remembers that there is nothing professional about what he is doing, nothing responsible or thought-out.

“I want to ravage you about three dozen different ways right now so don’t concern yourself with that. You’re afraid you’re going to change your mind if we don’t get on with this immediately, hmm?” He lunges for him, almost too fast for Ignis to process, prying his legs open and touching him, calloused fingers on his dick, thumb running over his head and smearing precome down his shaft. “ _You won’t_.”

He doesn’t remember seeing Ardyn take out the bottle, something he’d suggested they make a detour for before getting a room at the Quayside, a purchase that Ignis had been far too embarrassed to witness. But he must have taken it out, because he’d paused just as Ignis was about to beg, and when his fingers returned they were coated with a slickness that makes him gasp. He hears Ardyn murmuring to him, but he can’t decipher any words because he is pushing a finger _inside of him_. He’s fingered himself before, much to his shame at the time. He’d read enough about it, looked at enough diagrams and even watched a few videos when he had a little much-needed privacy, and he’d been able to find his prostate easily enough. This is different, so different.

He arches his back, whimpering, unsure if he should push down on those fingers or up into his other hand. Ardyn who is laughing softly now as he suddenly touches that spot inside of Ignis that makes him forget the world, his entire sense of self reduced to the parts of his body that Ardyn is touching. Nothing else matters anymore, and he would exchange the sun in the sky for it to last forever.

“My, _my_ , you are a fast one, aren’t you?”

It takes him a fractured moment to understand what happened, but the panic and the shame immediately overtakes whatever afterglow he might have had. A thousand _sorries_ are on his lips but Ardyn stops him with a finger over his mouth.

“What did I say about apologies? I was your age. Once. Possibly twice but certainly once.”

 _Age_. Ignis hadn’t wanted to ask. Something deep in his bones tells him he doesn’t want to know.

-

He’d dropped the coat, the scarf, the regalia and the vests, but it isn’t enough. Because Ignis is still clinging to his shirt, the thigh that he’s been frantically rubbing against still clothed. He’d revitalized quickly enough, lying on the bed while Ardyn massaged him and rambled on about something or another. Something Ignis probably would have liked to talk about were he more coherent, not that the older man minded his lack of response, because he’s on top of him again, kissing him as he grinds down against his nakedness.

“Take everything off.” The authority in Ignis’ voice surprises even him.

He makes a sound that could be a snort of derision or one of laughter. “Aren’t you a demanding one. How about you do it for me?”

He hesitates. It’s too much agency. He isn’t prepared for this, but still he reaches for his shirt, unbuttoning it with trembling fingers as Ardyn watches through half-closed eyes. He’s thinner than Ignis had initially expected, first seeing him in all those layers, shedding his frame with his clothing, but still larger and more muscled than him, with a solid chest and broad shoulders and arms wide enough to make Ignis’ gut twist. Ignis had never really been certain of a type, had never allowed himself to dwell on it too deeply when someone who might fit too much of that definition was constantly in the backseat of the Regalia, but he knows now that this, _this_. Ardyn. There’s a vicious scar on his right side, just below his pectoral, that Ignis reflexively touches, the healer in him startled, but Ardyn only laughs and catches his hand, slowly guides it down over his abs, hard enough to make Ignis skittish, his naval and his pubic trail. He doesn’t let himself think as Ardyn shifts his weight, allows him to unbuckle his belt and ease his pants down.

He’s seen other men naked, in the locker rooms at high school or during Crownsguard training and in public baths. But never men aroused, much less men aroused because of him. When Ignis cautiously touches him, he finds himself trembling in awe.

-

"I'll stop if it _hurts_ too much."

There’s something about the way he says it, the way his voice lilts and he grins when he says _hurts_ , that makes Ignis believe he won’t stop, not now. It does hurt; it hurts a lot more than he expected and he isn’t sure if he wants to go on, but he’s already _inside of him_. Ignis was not raised to consider his own discomfort, and after all he wants this. More than anything he wants this. So he shakes his head once and hooks his ankles together, drawing Ardyn still further into him as he sighs. As he wraps his arms around the older man’s back, he feels a number of old scars across it, and suddenly he feels a rush of emotion for this stranger, this _inconsequential nobody_ , who had pushed his way into his life and laid bare his sorrow. “Ardyn,” he whispers. “Move.”

Ardyn obeys, drawing back and thrusting into him harder than Ignis expects, making him yelp. He slaps his hand over his face, bites into the flesh between his thumb and index finger and suppresses the next sound threatening to come from his throat.

"Don't fight it, just let it feel good," that raspy low voice in his ear whispers.

He whimpers, suddenly terrified at the loss of control. Terrified and excited, to be entering such new territory in his life. Not only sex but the shedding of his responsibilities. He has never just been able to let something feel good, never been able to enjoy anything in life without considering how it affects others, without putting the comfort and safety of the prince first. He smiles then, presses his face into the older man's shoulder and inhales deeply. He lets himself go.

-

He wavers at the door, glances back at the man he’s just recklessly, _unfathomably_ had sex with. Ardyn is lying in bed, on his back with an arm flung over his eyes. Ignis is unsure if he’s dozing or not, the rise and fall of his chest slow and steady.

"Get me my phone." Decidedly not asleep.

The command is a little off-putting, but Ignis ignores it. He himself had been commanding enough recently. Their fingers touch when he hands him his phone, and Ignis jerks his hand back as if burned. It’s too soon. If he thinks too deeply on that touch, he’ll be back in bed.

"What's your number?"

He rattles it off, watching as the older man punches it in.

"Oh," Ignis says softly, because a moment later his phone buzzes and he sees a text on the screen. Nothing significant. An emoji of a black chocobo, an odd choice for a man his age. Ignis wonders suddenly if he enjoys riding. _He certainly has the arms and thighs for it._ He blushes.

"That's what you were worried about? Weren't sure if the number I gave you was real?" he laughs, but there is no mockery there. "Go home. Answer whenever you're ready, or not if you change your mind. I'll most assuredly respond."

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He’s uncomfortable in the morning, stiff and sore and cramping. He’d expected it, but it’s still offputting as he downs a few aspirin and an extra cup of ebony.

No one asks why he took over three hours to go grocery shopping last night, or why he returned to the camp with his hair damp and his usually pristine clothing rumpled. It wasn’t unusual, for Ignis to wander off during his shopping expeditions – after all, he was the responsible one, the one who actively sought out information from the locals about the political climate, the one who often stopped in at every town’s library to poke around, the one who determined how long a place was worth staying in before moving on. No, nobody ever questioned when he was away for a time, because they always just assumed he was off being _responsible_.

Ignis was most definitely irresponsible last night, the bruises on his ass and thighs, the suck marks on his throat and chest, and his still-kiss-swollen lower lip from when Ardyn had bitten him lingering proof of his transgressions. It makes him shudder in delight.

Over the next forty-eight hours he looks at his phone a thousand times, staring at the number and the small black chocobo on the screen over and over. It irks him a little, the innocence of Ardyn’s emoji choice, but he supposes it suits him. The man has quite the tongue on him, sharp and clever and unapologetically brutal. Of course he would find this amusing.

It takes him a long time to reply, only doing so after a particularly torturous lunch stop where all he could think of was those heavy-lidded golden eyes as he fidgeted in his seat and struggled to appear interested in what the rest were discussing. He types it fast, pressing send before he can stop to consider what he’s doing, to consider how _un_ -Ignis he’s being. _< Fantasies of your fingers in your mouth and your thick, hard cock thrust to the hilt inside of me have fortified me through yet another insufferable conversation.> _

Ardyn doesn’t reply for over an hour, every minute an eternity as Ignis checked his phone again and again. He grows increasingly unnerved, anxious as he remembers weeping after sex the other night, remembers Ardyn affectionately patting his hair and telling him it was only nerves, that it was common to cry afterwards, that he had nothing to be ashamed of. _But had he rolled his eyes while saying it?_ Ignis can’t be certain, no matter how many times he runs the scene through his head. But then, finally, _< Aren’t you the filthy one? Do I have the honor of opening you up?>_

The innuendo is enough of a counter to the sarcasm to make Ignis grin in relief as he types out a reply.

-

He rarely touches himself. A general lack of privacy, guilt over his inclinations, and a complete lack of anything or anyone worthwhile to think about while doing so – he’d thought of Gladio a few times and Cor Leonis more than once, but being unable to make eye contact the following morning prevented him from doing this often – contributed to what he’d always felt was a low sex drive. A sex drive he now knows not to be deficient at all, only slumbering. Because now. _Now_ he has someone and something to think about beyond a mere fantasy. The thought makes him tremble with need, and his hand is slipping below his waistband before he can stop himself.

He remembers the feel of his stubble against his thighs, his perineum, his balls as the older man took him in his mouth and made him sing. Those hands pressing his hips down, spreading his ass and holding him still as he enters him. That cock, so thick and heavy, filling him up in such a way that he knew he’d never feel complete again without it. He’s panting softly, the name a silent plea on every breath. Ardyn Ardyn _Ardyn_. It’s what he’d whimpered, keened again and again as he approached climax, running his fingers through the older man’s hair and curling around him, wanting to preserve that moment forever.

He barely has time to stifle his groan as he climaxes, slapping his hand over his mouth so violently he bites his tongue, but it’s enough to still the sound. And then he’s shuddering, silently gasping as he comes down from his high. He remembers Ardyn licking his come off of his fingers after jerking him off as if it were the most natural thing, and tentatively raises his hand to his lips. _No_. He’s wiping his hand off on the towel he’d snuck into his bed before he can consider it further. It’s only then that he remembers that he’s in a hotel room with three other men, and he glances around furtively.

No-one else stirs. Noctis continues to sleep on his face, dead to the world while Prompto snores beside him and Gladio lies like one of the kings of yore after too many years in military barrack cots. The rest could probably sleep through a bomb. An all-around success. He pushes his face into the pillow and hums in satisfaction. For all of his responsibilities, all of the moments in his life when he’d stepped forward and bore the weight of the world on his shoulders, all the times he’d sacrificed his own time and energy and emotional stamina to assist others or attend another diplomatic ceremony or ace another exam, it’s somehow _this,_ a shamefully torrid fuck with a stranger and silent masturbations in the dark while reminiscing on it, that makes him feel like an adult.

For the first time in months, since the day King Regis informed him that he was to take Noctis across the country to Tenebrae, Ignis Scientia sleeps the sleep of the content. Deep, uninterrupted, and full of dreams.

He awakens to the news that Insomnia has fallen.

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_< On the road to Lestallum.>_ Short, abrupt, but enough. He hasn’t spoken to Ardyn in days, had only texted him once to ensure that he was still alive, because there had been the real possibility that he _wasn’t_ , and Ignis hadn’t realized just how much he cared until death came into the picture.

He hasn’t thought about anything but death in days, but enough is enough and he needs to find the strength to bear his king up. He remembers the surge of power and satisfaction and confidence he felt beneath the older man. It’s what he needs right now.

 _< It’s taking you a remarkably long time to drive 217 kilometers.>_ It’s as if he knows that Ignis doesn’t want to talk about anything serious. And then a second text. “I’m in the area myself. It sounds like you have quite a bit of free time, no?”

He glances over at the rest of them, Noctis fishing, which he’s been doing an awful lot of lately though nobody has the heart to tell him to give it a rest, and Prompto and Gladio playing an exceptionally heated card game. He wants to be irritated at them, but he can no longer criticize anyone for being irresponsible. This somehow comes as a relief, and he suddenly feels a surge of love towards his friends. He can understand them now, just a little bit. < _Quite a lot. >_

_< I can show you a few elemancy tricks. You said you prefer daggers? Ideal for this. 31.7164/ 60.9743>_

Ignis bites his lip to keep from grinning too widely. GPS coordinates. It shouldn’t impress him, but it does. He punches the numbers into his phone before replying and gives pause when he sees the distance. It’s close. _Too close_ , something in his gut warns him, and he remembers the unease he’d felt on occasion the other night. But he ignores it, because the temptation is too great, and he’s fairly certain he can handle a dirty old man if he proves to be a stalker. He smiles to himself as he unbuttons the top two buttons of his shirt before replying, _< Only a twenty-minute walk. See you soon.>_

Yes, he can handle him if things go awry. He’s in the Crownsguard, after all.

 - 

He'd learned in that first night to let himself go and he never looked back.

Because Ardyn doesn't care how much he cries and drools and sweats. He only laughs and kisses him if he comes too early, too often or, as happened once, not at all. He doesn't care what sort of sounds he makes or what desperate demands or supplications he gives out. He never gets impatient if Ignis doesn't understand something, doesn't know what he wants. He doesn't expect Ignis to be clean and composed after traversing a dungeon or camping for three nights in a row. He never minds if Ignis gets too excited or rough, if he suddenly has the urgent need for fingers up his ass or wants a third round of sex.

No. Ardyn never minds. Ignis wants to believe it's because he likes him, adores him, but he supposed it doesn't matter. The sex is good and the conversations are just as titillating, enthralling. Ardyn lets him be himself. He urges him on when he finds himself getting excited, worked up about something he never feels he can talk about with his friends. He feeds his mind and opens new doors for him, sends him down unexpected hallways of knowledge. How to infuse daggers with magic, how to draw healing elements from plants and how to properly store them, how best to quiet an enraged spiracorn and slip past it without further provocation. And then he fucks him senseless in whatever hotel is nearest, never once suggesting the car or a caravan or the open field.

From all of this, he learns that he is _attractive_ , that he can be _wanted_ by others, that he has an allure of his own beyond merely being an attachment to the king. He’d been embarrassed, even ashamed, when Ardyn first began praising him in both body and mind. But Ardyn encourages him at every turn until Ignis is cocking his hip just right, moving his ass and giving him eyes that beckon him to bed and murmuring the same filthy words he’d only been able to text just a week before. Ignis grows into his sexuality so quickly his sluttishness horrifies him at times, but it’s only for _him_.

Ardyn who now sits in the car beside him, seat pushed back as far as possible while he props his feet on the dashboard and studies the map in his lap. He looks slightly bored, as if he already has the land memorized and is only looking at a map because it’s something to do, but still he traces his fingers along the roads.

Ignis watches him, lulled to a sluggish contentment by the air conditioner at full blast as he reclines in the passenger seat. “You know the whole landscape of Lucis already, don’t you?”

“Probably.”

“Have you ever been anywhere else? Tenebrae…?” He knows many now prefer not to call Tenebrae what it is, prefer to simply consider it a part of Niflheim, but after four meetings now, three of which took place after the fall of Insomnia, Ardyn well knows his political views and seems to agree at nearly every turn.

“Of course. I was old enough to travel on my own when they were still a free kingdom twenty-odd years ago. Their train system is truly impressive, but,” he leans forward and slaps the dashboard affectionately. “I like going at my own speed.”

Ardyn’s driving puts Noctis’ lack of attention to detail, speed limits, and traffic signs to shame. Ignis would certainly never get in the car with him had he already not learned to sacrifice all control over his life when around him. He’d already let this man into his body.

“And Niflheim?”

The older man sighs softly then and folds up the map. “Their magic is admirable but Aldercapt’s border patrol is rather extreme.”

Ignis notes the lack of respect in Ardyn’s failure to call him Emperor and smiles. It’s enough to let him ignore the fact that Ardyn had not answered the question.

A fact he not only ignores, but forgets a moment later when Ardyn speaks again, “Shall we go somewhere?”

Ardyn half-closes his eyes, smiles out of the corner of his mouth, and Ignis feels his stomach twist as the older man starts the car without waiting for a response. He’s alarmingly attractive, even with his obvious disregard for his own appearance. His apparent inability to remember to shave every day or style his hair into a presentable fashion would irritate Ignis in anyone else, but in _Ardyn_ he lets all of his standards slide. Ardyn of the silken tongue and strong arms, bearing him down into the mattress as he enters him and makes him his with every thrust of his hips and whispered promise in his ear.

“Please.” His response is unfailing.

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It’s ten days after Insomnia’s fall before he can say anything.

"I can't tonight." This has been the fifth time they’d met since the collapse of the world Ignis knew, every time under the pretense of training, of practicing magic before a furtive fuck in a hotel, because while Ignis has desperately craved the comfort of the older man’s arms, it was alarmingly difficult to ask for. But he can’t handle sex right now.

Ardyn shrugs as he traces a finger down Ignis’ thigh. "In that case, I might at least _begin_ to recover from the other night with another twenty-four hours rest.”

“Please don’t joke this evening.”

He has his full attention now.

"My parents were in Insomnia." His voice cracks as he says it, and with it he breaks.

Ardyn stiffens, the expression on his face changing abruptly into something like unease. They’ve never discussed anything deeply personal before. They’d never asked about one anothers’ families or pasts. Such formalities hardly seemed necessary when Ignis had spread his legs for him without even knowing his full name, a fact that he still didn’t know. And if Ignis weren’t already struggling to hold back the tears, he’d be afraid that Ardyn would leave him now. They’ve spoken and enjoyed one another’s company well enough, but their relationship up until this moment had undeniably been one almost entirely of sex. _No strings attached sex._

"Shall I pretend I am not witnessing this?" He finally asks then, softly.

"Please," he whispers, and he closes his eyes as he feels the older man brush past him.

He buries his face in his arms and sobs, truly sobs, for the first time since he was a child first seeing Prince Noctis in his wheelchair, in pain and possibly disabled for life. 

He weeps for his parents. He hadn't been particularly close to them; it wasn't possible when he had essentially been adopted by the king at the age of six. But that hardly matters now. They are gone, and now he can never be close, never again know the comforting arms of his mother and the gentle guidance of his father. They will never bear witness as he stands by Noctis as he ascends the throne. They will never hear how their only child becomes General to the King. They will never learn that their son has accomplished everything he ever wanted in life. They will never see how he has finally accepted himself.

He weeps for his uncle, retainer to the king before him, as distant as he was. His uncle who instilled responsibility in him, who pushed him to excel at everything possible and taught him how to dress to be respected. His uncle who always stepped in for him when confronted with an impossible task, but who also stepped aside and let him take over whatever duties he wished.

And he weeps for King Regis, his second father, closer to him than his own blood. Regis, who encouraged him to take time off, to enjoy himself and play and find his own interests despite having employed him to watch over his son. Regis who allowed him to enter into the Crownsguard training before he was old enough, who found private tutors for him when he realized just how intelligent he was, who celebrated his birthdays with the same pomp and circumstance as he celebrated Noctis’. Regis, who loved and adored him as if he were truly his son.

No one had ever told him what grief was, how the loss of someone could suck the very air from one's lungs and never allow them to reach full capacity again, how every breath drawn thereafter makes one's bones ache with longing. How one’s fingers now bear a new weight and one’s limbs feel dragged down towards the grave. In one day he'd lost his entire family, his king, his home, and the life he knew. There isn't much air in the world left for him, and he fears that he can't survive another loss. _Let me die before Noctis does, before Gladiolus and Prompto. Let me never see them suffer from pain or illness or old age. I don’t care for how selfish it is._ And then he remembers, and he regrets.

What seems as an eternity passes before he hears footsteps behind him, feels arms gently wrap around his shoulders and a whisper in his ear. "I'm not always the best with, ah, obeying orders. And you look a tad forlorn."

Ignis doesn't resist. He doesn't have the energy to. But he doesn't respond either, doesn't wrap his fingers around the older man's hands or lean into his touch or turn to kiss him like he wants to.

Because he regrets Ardyn. Because now he has someone more to lose.

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Ignis flinches, hand flying up to his face to hide the blush he can feel rising as he adjusts his glasses and tries to pass the behavior off as normal. Because Ardyn is suddenly there, on the streets of Lestallum, and he’s looking right at them.

“Well if it isn’t the King of Lucis,” he purrs softly, heavy-lidded eyes only half open as his leans back against the lamp-post behind him. Something in the way he says it makes Ignis squirm and shift his weight. He’s holding a small satchel, as if only returning from shopping. He spends an alarming amount of money on bizarre, esoteric goods only to dispose of them within a matter of days or even hours, as if he simply needs to get his hands on everything in Eos if only to say he touched it.

“Well if it isn’t _the Inconsequential Man_.”

“That’s me,” he says pleasantly, a perfect counter to Gladio’s nastiness. “Though perhaps better to be inconsequential overall than of great stature in all but one area.”

Noctis snorts, then coughs and clears his throat loudly. “What do you want?”

“Mmm? Nothing. I simply heard the king was in town and wanted to offer my services.” He ignores Ignis, directing every word instead at his majesty.

“What services?” Noctis is still smirking, clearly too amused at Ardyn’s casual jab. He always seems mildly confused at Ardyn’s existence, his occasional appearance at odd moments, but not alarmed or concerned. _He’s too naïve_ , Ignis thinks, and wonders absently at what that makes him.

“If you need a ride anywhere. Your car seems to be in….disrepair.”

It is, but it is a fact he only knows because Ignis had complained to him about the engine light being on for the last 57 kilometers. _It’s the transmission. It’s always the most horribly expensive thing._

Noctis cocks his head and makes that soft sound he often makes when thinking. It apparently doesn’t cross his mind to wonder at how Ardyn knows this. “Sure. We’ll keep it in mind.”

“Delightful. I’ll be in town a couple more days. I’m sure you can find me at any one of the magic shops.” As Ardyn turns he catches Ignis’ eye and winks, a clear invitation to _something_ later that evening, only to stumble suddenly to the side, favoring his left leg.

The action is startling in its familiarity. _Noctis_. He glances at the king, wondering if he had noticed, wondering if he himself had even seen what he thinks he’s seen. Because he’s fairly certain that Ardyn has no old injury but for the one in his side, which had never affected his balance as far as he’d seen. No. Ardyn is putting on a show. _He’s mocking him_ , he realizes, and his gut lurches. There’s that _unease_ again, picking away at the base of his spine. Something is off with Ardyn and he can’t quite place what. But then Ardyn waves with a good-natured _Tah-tah!_   and he’s gone.

It comes to him later. _Territorial._ _He wants me for himself._ It’s why he’s around a little too often, why he sometimes dares to show up when Ignis is with his friends. Reminding him of his presence in a vaguely threatening way. He’s possessive. It isn’t a becoming trait, and he knows he should be alarmed, but instead it sends a thrill through him.

It was one thing to be needed, and Ignis has always been needed. By the late king, by the new king, by the Shield, by the gunslinger, by the council and by the Kingsglaive captain what seems like an age ago now. His advice, his intellect, his healing abilities, his steadfast loyalty, his reason, his borderline-maternal care, and his quick feet in battle have always been needed.

Yes, it is one thing to be needed, but another thing entirely to be wanted. He slips his phone from his pocket and texts a meeting time and the coordinates of the nearest hotel to Ardyn.

-

“Noctis doesn’t seem like much of a king yet, does he?”

Ignis hesitates. The trouble with Ardyn is the sharpness of his tongue; it’s difficult to know when he’s being a sarcastic bitch and when he’s just being a little too blunt in his genuine questioning. “It’s a big title to fit into at his age, and it happened so suddenly.”

“Mm hmm, and I suppose the throne is sort of off-limits to him right now anyhow. Being a king without a people he can protect must be trying. I still can’t believe that idiot of an _emperor_ ravaged the city as he did,” he sighs softly.

There is true sorrow in his voice, and Ignis wonders not for the first time where Ardyn came from. His accent and dialect are unidentifiable. Insomnia’s immigrant population had surged in the last fifty years; perhaps he’d been the child of a couple of them, raised elsewhere just long enough to adopt the accent, but a resident of the city long enough to feel its absence.

“It’s a good thing Prompto is with us. I think it’s best that someone not born into a role is around to keep Noctis grounded.” It’s too much. He shouldn’t be saying so much, but Ardyn is warm at his back and he can still feel his fluids inside of him and somehow, not a whole lot else matters as long as he’s pleasantly fucked and the king is safe, which Ignis is certain that he is with Gladio around. _He doesn’t need me every second._ He still can’t wrap his mind around how _good_ sex can be, how all-consuming it is.

“Not born into a role, is he?” Ardyn hums. “He’s rather skittish, is he not?”

“Prompto’s sweet,” he sighs as he stretches his legs out. There’s a bite mark on his thigh that will last for days and he hopes Gladio won’t suggest the public bath anytime soon. “I worry about him a bit. He seems too…”

“Gentle for this world?”

“I was going to say fragile but yes. Noctis’ father” – he can’t bring himself to say his name – “thought it would do him good to come with us. He certainly brightens the trip, but he’s awfully anxious. Always thinking that he isn’t really good enough or that he doesn’t belong for some reason.”

“And is Gladiolus as insecure as the rest of them?”

He huffs softly and rearranges himself against the older man’s broad chest. “A little. He worries about being strong enough to be the King’s Shield.”

“And yet you don’t seem to worry about being capable enough to be the king’s general, hm?”

 _General_. Ignis had blurted it out once, early on, how he wanted to be the General to the King, and Ardyn hadn’t laughed. He’d accepted it and _remembered_. Ignis feels warm and safe and wanted as he replies. “No. It’s different, isn’t it? That I don’t have to follow in an ancestor’s footsteps like Noctis and Gladio do. My uncle was retainer before me but nothing more. Noctis’ father didn’t even have a general.”

“He relied too heavily on the Kingsglaive, it seems...” Ardyn sighs before waving his hand lazily. “But enough of that dreadful business. What’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve done?”

The suddenness and strangeness of the question makes Ignis lean back over Ardyn’s shoulder and glance up at him. But it’s a relief, because he doesn’t want to think about King Regis any longer, doesn’t want to be forced to consider all of the mistakes the late ruler had made that led to his demise and the downfall of his kingdom and the destruction of everything Ignis knew. “Have sex with an incorrigible old man.”

“Yes, that was a very bad idea on your part, wasn’t it?”

“I kissed Gladio when we were teenagers. Fifteen or so. He didn’t notice.”

“If you kissed him the way you kiss me, that’d be impossible.”

“Mm, wasn’t quite like that. A tad more subtle. It was when he was getting that tattoo of his. I’d asked to see it in the locker room one day and he took his shirt off to show me. I touched it and leaned against him and kissed his shoulder for some inexplicable reason. He just looked so _wounded_. But he turned on me quickly as soon as I did it, pushed me back against the wall.” _And glared at me and rested his forehead against mine for a few seconds and let our breaths mingle before growling and stepping back and away and never to mention it again._ But Ardyn doesn’t need to know all of that.

“It sounds like he noticed.”

“And didn’t take it well. Better to hope he didn’t notice.”

“Ah…probably. I might have had an incident or two like that in my past.” Ardyn had never clarified his preferences, but Ignis knew that he was not an exception by any means. He had known other men, and very likely women too, if anything could be read into the way he smiled at them on the streets. And again, as if the older man knew what he was thinking, “Do you still like him?”

He reflects on his earlier revelation. _Possessive_. “Not in that way any longer. It’s just… a little difficult to be around him sometimes.”

“He _does_ seem to have a peculiar aversion to shirts.”

Ignis laughs, and as he does Ardyn abruptly turns on his side and pushes Ignis down onto the mattress. He’s still laughing as the older man kisses his way down his chest and belly and nuzzles his dick that isn’t quite hard but could be in a matter of seconds. He’s still laughing when Ardyn sits back on his heels and pulls Ignis’ hips up so far that he’s nearly perpendicular to the bed, ass resting on Ardyn’s chest, and then he’s letting out a sharp gasp as he feels his tongue where it’s never been before.

“Oh, oh gods, that’s my---”

“That’s the point,” Ardyn says pleasantly, and lowers his head again.

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He avoids Gladio as long as he can.

He’d stumbled into camp early that morning, though not early enough, because everyone else was awake. Prompto had stared wide-eyed and Noctis had opened his mouth, but Gladio had shoved him before he had the chance to utter a sound. The two younger men kept quiet about it, though Ignis knew he couldn’t avoid the Shield for long with the haughty looks he kept shooting him. Not angry, exactly, but concerned and frustrated. _You abandoned your role and your king. You damn well better have a good reason._ Ignis is certain that’s all it is. He knows from the texts that they knew he was at a hotel, that his friends had come to the conclusion that he had a paramour.

He makes it to the evening before Gladio catches him while the other two are playing at the arcade.

“I don’t wanna say I’m surprised at you, but I am. We were pretty worried at first… Even after pinpointing your location to a hotel, Noctis didn’t think you were there willingly.”

He isn’t sure if he should be flattered that Noctis was worried or irritated that he couldn’t conceive of Ignis having a life of his own, but there’s no point in pursuing those thoughts. It will never be brought up with Noctis, nor Prompto for that matter. Talking about sex around the latter would only increase his general anxiety at existence. _He was probably the most concerned._ “My apologies. I hadn’t really…kept up with the time. I didn’t plan on falling asleep there either.”

"Can’t be helped now. Just let one of us know next time.” He pauses. “There will be a next time, I’m sure. You’ve been in such a good mood lately. Who is she?"

The warmth he feels in his gut at hearing how Gladio had noticed a difference in him evaporates abruptly. _She? How could you not know? After all these years?_ He'd always tried to hide it, had always prided himself at being able to do what he believed was a decent job, but it unexpectedly hurts to hear that _Gladio_ hadn't even noticed. He really must not have noticed anything all those years ago, or had perhaps forgotten. "He," he says softly, unable to make eye contact.

He hears Gladio inhale through his teeth and exhale through his nose, his telltale sign of discomfort. _Biting his lower lip, I’m sure._ And all he says is, “Oh.”

“It isn’t relevant and it will hardly impact my duties,” he feels more than he hears the words spilling from his mouth, every syllable a sharp stab in his throat. “Please don’t think about it any further. I’d –”

“Ignis.”

He ignores him. “I’d appreciate it if you kept this between us.” And then he turns on his heel and walks from the room before Gladio can say his name again, before he can let his blood run cold and his heart wither.

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Their sixth hunt together, Ardyn takes him to find the ziggurat. It at once thrills and frightens Ignis, knowing what kind of quarry he can track with the older man at his side. Ardyn is the most highly ranked hunter he’s ever heard of, a fact that shocked him when they’d stopped by the Meldacio headquarters one day and a tipster mentioned it. It explains a lot. The power and confidence he exudes, the way so many apparent strangers defer to him, even lower their eyes or, as Ignis has seen more than once, _bow_. Ardyn has probably saved thousands of lives in his time, to have killed as many demons as is necessary to attain his rank. It pleases Ignis, knowing that Ardyn sacrifices his time and his well-being to assist others, even if the way he looks at others can be a little _off_. There is a lot about Ardyn that is a little _off_ , if Ignis thinks about it too deeply.

The assumption of the skill that comes with such a rank is why Ignis never expects Ardyn to be injured. He knows that even Clarus Amiticia had his scars, but Ardyn is too fluid and quick for such matters, so quick that more than once Ignis had wondered if he’s capable of warp-striking. _Impossible_. All of Ardyn’s scars are old, very old, garnered in his first few decades, and therefore Ignis is pleasantly, sadistically amused when the ziggurat lands a brutal blow on the older man.

He blasts him with a healcast, slapping him none too gently as he does so. “I’ve been waiting weeks to see you get nailed.”

The laughter dies in his throat, because Ardyn is still crouched low to the ground, face in a grimace of what could be pain, could be rage. _It didn’t heal._

“Shit,” he hisses under his breath, reaching for his pouch. He’s read that some demon-inflicted wounds are impervious to basic healcasting, but he’d never witnessed it. A potion next. Then the first aid kit. He can stitch him up if he has to, though the wound is bad, deep, deep enough that Ignis is worried about his brachial artery. There isn’t enough blood for an artery, but there is too much for what this is, and the usual calm that takes over him in the battlefield is withering. _I don’t know what to do._

“It’s fine,” Ardyn speaks through bared teeth. “I should have warned you ziggurats can do this.” As he speaks, there is a shriek of despair behind him, and Ignis turns just in time to see the demon melt _. What kind of magic could have caused that? Is there something else around?_ But the thought is gone as quickly as it crosses his mind; all that matters now is stopping the flow of blood.

But the potion doesn’t work. _How is it possible that he’s bleeding so much from that?_ “I don’t, I can’t…”

He doesn’t realize how fast he is breathing until Ardyn grabs his wrist and the brutality in his grasp startles the younger man back to Eos.

“Ignis.” His voice is low and hoarse, not quite his bedroom voice but something close. “Really. I’m fine.”

But he isn’t. Ignis had seen how the recent spurts of blood pulsing through his fingers were different, streaks of black running throughout, wispy tendrils that jerked and rippled as if alive. He opens his mouth to speak again, to suggest an antidote because that is most definitely not normal, but Ardyn is laying his hand over the wound, pressing his palm to it and smearing the blood up his arm until it’s only a stain on his black coat.

The blood that remains is red, and his skin is unmarred. “I don’t mean to discourage you, but I _am_ a better healer. Please don’t concern yourself so much.”

Ignis is silent. He’s trained with the best in Insomnia, and what he lacked in strength and experience he knew he made up for in intelligence and quick thinking. He knows what healcasting is, but he also knows what it isn’t. Ardyn had worked no magic. His body had healed itself.

“Ignis,” his voice lilts as he snaps his fingers in front of his face. “No need to worry. You’ll attain this level one day.”

 _If I were to attain the power of the Astrals._ “Of course. Just…coming face to face with my inadequacies is unsettling.”

“And here I thought you were worried about me.” He’s grinning now though, and suddenly his hand is on Ignis’ thigh, running up until he grabs him through his pants and brings a ragged gasp from him. It brings him back, _again_.

“Ah ah. Not in the open.” He pushes Ardyn’s hand down, mimicking the earlier motion, but he doesn’t let go, and the older man responds in kind when Ignis hesitantly weaves his fingers between his and squeezes.

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They’re at a hotel again, waiting until nightfall because Ardyn had discovered the perfect spot to witness the comet expected to cross the sky in 107 minutes, and Ignis is far more excited about this than he wishes to admit. The older man’s fixation with the stars overshadows even his own, as if he had an affinity towards ancient light lingering long after death. They are not fucking but reading, Ignis a highly questionable novel that Ardyn had given him _for ideas_ and the older man an elemancy guide that he clearly has strong opinions about. Strong opinions he conveys with a long string of words muttered under his breath.

Ignis only catches a few, but it’s enough. His jaw drops before he can make it work enough to ask, “Do you know Orionian?”

Orionian. The ancient language of Lucis, not spoken for nearly fifteen hundred years. Ignis had stumbled upon hundreds of books filled with such scrawl when younger, had labored through them with dictionaries but ultimately been unable to plunder their depths without a grasp on the grammar. The few tomes that described it were all one-of-a-kind, closely guarded and beyond the reach of a bored teenager.

“More or less, though it’s an absolute horror at times. There are eleven declensions and no rhyme or reason to their usage. Would you like to learn it?”

The depths of Ardyn’s knowledge are unfathomable, as if he’d lived a thousand lifetimes in the time it takes one to draw breath. His knowledge far exceeds that of any tutor, any scholar or professor, that Ignis has had the opportunity to meet, and he has met the greatest minds in the nation. And what he _does_ know. So much rare knowledge, ancient lore and forgotten spells and the languages necessary to study them. Ignis had always been bored in school, frustrated with those who didn’t know how to maneuver around his ambition, his intellect, his determination to become General to the King, who only ever held him back. But _Ardyn_ , Ardyn offers the world.

Ignis finds himself reaching towards him, fingers trembling as he presses into the older man’s coats and feels those arms fold around him. _Teach me. Teach me everything you know and I will be yours._

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The Shield gestures towards Ignis’ bare arms and laughs, "Used to tease me about showing off my arms all the time and here you are."

He shrugs, guarded and uncertain. "It's been so hot. And it’s only a T-shirt." But a T-shirt is a lot for him, given his propensity towards long sleeves and gloves. He’s been naked around Ardyn enough, Ardyn who so often grabs his ass or pinches his nipples and croons about how beautiful he is, to be less reserved. It wasn’t that he had been self-conscious so much as simply unaware.

"You're a lot more confident now. With your body. I remember when that first happened with me. Good sex does that."

He can't remember a time when Gladio wasn't confident about his appearance, and wonders at when he first started having sex. _With women, I'm sure._ He doesn't want to talk about this. Gladio hadn’t mentioned his new partner after that initial conversation, but he’d been making an obvious effort to talk less about women around him, to the point where Noctis had recently asked if he was suffering from erectile dysfunction. But he’s said nothing to the younger men, and Ignis is thankful for that. He’ll talk about it if that’s what Gladio wishes. “I have felt…better recently. He’s been very encouraging.”

“Mm hmm. Is he experienced then?”

“He’s older, if that’s what you’re asking.” He hesitates, wonders but he can see the question in Gladio’s eyes and pushes onwards. “And before you ask, yes, much older.”

"How long did you know him before he fucked you?"

The crude bluntness makes him startle. And the validity of his concern, because he distinctly remembers a thigh between his legs and a mouth over his less than an hour after Ardyn had approached him. Better to round up. "An hour or two? What's it to you? I was the one who asked for it."

"An _hour_? Ignis, that isn't like you."

"And how would you know what I'm like?" _Because we never fucked, because you never crawled between my thighs and worshipped me as this man does. As much as I wanted it for so many years, as much as I tried to flirt with you, you ignored me._

Gladio's eyes widen for the briefest of moments. "Fair enough. Just be careful, yea? Bad enough I have to worry about Iris."

He bristles at this. "I know what I’m doing.”

But he doesn’t.

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Ardyn sleeps an abnormal amount, even more so than Noctis, which Ignis hadn't thought was humanly possible. He dozes after eating, after sex, after driving, after anything that requires any energy. It isn't because of any weakness as far as Ignis can tell; the man has enough strength and energy to take on an army when it suits him. It's almost a personality quirk, as if he's simply weary of the world. There's something catlike about him, lazy and languid yet unpredictable and clever.

Ignis likes it. He likes it a lot. Because while Ardyn never refuses him and is always happy to satiate his needs, he isn’t demanding of his attention. He’s currently upside-down in an armchair, knees bent over the back and head hanging over the seat. A strange position, but there’s no point in commenting on Ardyn messing up his hair when it’s a capital offense to begin with.

“Ever wonder about destiny?” he says suddenly. “Some big stupid _rock_ making choices for the mortals of the world?”

“Hm?” Ignis places his mug down and arches his eyebrows in confusion. They’ve had serious conversations enough by now, conversations of the necessity of mortality and the futility of the epic hero’s fate and the nature of evil, for this to not be too unusual, but the question lacks the context of books and folktales and old scrolls they’d found taped to the underside of shelves in apothecaries.

“Why do we put up with it? You, a Scientia, being a retainer simply because the Crystal decided your ancient ancestor was to be one. Gladio the Shield and Noctis the king for the same reason. Poor Prompto, utterly ignored by the gods because he wasn’t born with the right blood in his veins. Though perhaps it might be better to be ignored, better to never catch the eye of the divine so that one might live with no expectations, no responsibilities. Nothing to do and nothing to believe in, and therefore impervious to sorrow, betrayal, and disappointment. Yes, that would be better, wouldn’t it?”

“No, because Lucis has the power of the Astrals on its side and in return we accommodate their wishes,” he responds immediately, gut climbing up towards his throat. _We don’t though, not anymore._ He doesn’t have to say that though.

“Because the Astrals are _so_ worthy of being listened to at every turn. Bickering like children and killing one another, letting humans infringe upon their happenings. They aren’t even so powerful, when the lines are drawn in the sand. Isn’t it embarrassing, to obey a god that fell to an empire of soldiers lacking souls? Where’s the dignity in that?”

It’s blasphemy, what he’s saying, but he finds that he has no response.

“Maybe they are wrong sometimes. Had it ever occurred to you, what sort of life you could have had were you not turned over to the king at the age of six? Does Noctis even want to be king? Would he not perhaps be better off, happier and safer, if the Crystal hadn’t sapped the strength of his father and ordered him to take the throne?”

There is a savagery in his voice that gives Ignis pause. “Noctis has been deemed the True King.”

“Bullshit,” he sneers, catching the armrest and turning himself upright in one violent, fluid motion and slamming his boots on the floor. “Do any of you understand what that means? Wouldn’t it be more…humane, more _loyal_ to him, to defy the Astrals and let him live his life as he wishes, to declare one’s own divinity and master one’s own fate?”

The line of questioning is more than a little off now. It’s wrong, viciously _wrong_. “What’s the matter with you?”

“The people who sacrifice the most are often the ones the Crystal overlooks,” he narrows his eyes now, eyes that hold something Ignis can’t read. “I don’t like how you’ve been deprived your freedom by virtue of the royal line.”

And Ignis softens. He crosses the room before he knows it, stands before the chair and runs long fingers down Ardyn’s cheeks before leaning down to kiss him gently, and Ardyn unexpectedly folds into him.

Ignis is still, cradling his head to his chest as he strokes his hair and desperately tries to hold his doubts at bay. Because what if he is right? What if Noctis weren’t king? What if he weren’t bound to be the king’s retainer? What sort of life would he lead? He trembles when Ardyn unbuckles his belt and eases his pants down, gasps when the older man lowers his head and takes him in his mouth, and shivers as he tightens his grip and pulls at the auburn locks in his fists. _The sort of life where you don’t have to hide this._

Ardyn takes him on the floor.

He’s rough, too rough, and a sense of unease slowly unfurls at the base of Ignis’ spine as he arches his back and shudders. Ardyn is at once there and elsewhere, at once himself and something _other_. Ignis can’t quite comprehend it, but there is something very different about Ardyn tonight, in the way he half-chokes him and continually grabs his wrists to hold him still. _Ever wonder about destiny?_ He’s hurting him. Ignis shoves the heel of his hand into his shoulder, digs his nails into the back of Ardyn’s neck. He wants him to stop but he wants this to never end. Because the older man had always been so gentle before, commanding but gentle all the same. This is different, as Ardyn plants a boot against the wall behind them as he thrusts into him, giving him more leverage than Ignis is used to, and the _differentness_ of it is making him leak precome even before being touched. And then he feels the pressure around the base of his cock and keens in horror. _Not yet, sweet Ignis._ Ignis groans, desperately pushing back against Ardyn to relieve the pressure. He’s done this before, even used magic to bind his orgasm a couple of times, but there is a new glint in his eyes as he grinds his hips especially hard.

“Let’s play a little game, hm?”

 _Please, please, please._ He’ll agree to anything right now, so close to that blissful oblivion. “Yes,” he whines, uncaring of the desperation in his voice.

“Call me _your majesty_.”

“Wha—” but he can’t get the word out or even formulate a coherent thought and he can only moan an inarticulate plea as Ardyn thrusts into his spot again, thrusts and _holds_ , relentlessly pushing up against him. It’s what makes Ignis weakest and they both know it. He wants to come and he wants this to be over because he’s suddenly afraid.

“Say it.”

Ignis obeys, and as the words claw their way from his throat, they leave a bloody trail of wounds down to his heart.

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The wounds don’t heal the next day, and after that, they never have time to.

Because after confronting the Archaeon, Ignis finds himself aboard an airship that had emerged at _just_ the right moment to rescue him and the king’s entourage. As if it had been lingering there, waiting just beyond his peripheral vision. He’d known, a strange knowledge in his gut crying out in warning, the moment he’d seen the airship. _This is not full of Magitek soldiers to come kill us. It’s Ardyn._

Always by happenstance a little too close.

Ardyn Izunia. _Chancellor_ Ardyn Izunia. _Niflheim_ Chancellor.

The name is uncomfortably familiar, but he is too focused on the title to pay any heed to the anxiety building at such a familiarity. _I know you, I know you from somewhere, but everything before the_ now _is a lifetime ago._ Ignis has never felt so old and so young at the same time, a foolish child who has survived enough betrayals to feed a hundred lifetimes.

He leans against the airship window, staring down at Lucis, the land he so loves and has now betrayed. He’s never flown before, and any other day he’d feel in awe, but now he is so steeped in shame that the air is hard to breathe and his sight blurs with sorrow.

Ardyn Izunia, Chancellor of Niflheim. The most powerful man in the Empire, second only to Aldercapt. _I was touching myself, fantasizing about him during the very moments he struck down my kind and destroyed my country._ He knows Ardyn would find that little fact so very amusing.

And still he had kissed him of his own volition only minutes ago, grabbed the lapels of his coat and pulled the taller man down over him. Still he sucked Ardyn’s fingers and leaned into the leg pushed between his thighs. Still he ground into his hand and moaned in need just as he had the night they first met. Because he’s in this too deep, and even now he longs for his touch, that rough whisper in his ear. He’d given himself up to this man, offered him his body and soul and let him flood his veins and seep into his marrow.

Ignis Scientia does not trust easily, and he guards his heart well, but _Ardyn_. Ardyn who had only used him, who had fucked him into submission and buried his claws in his heart in order to get closer to the king. Ardyn who had threatened everything he’d ever known.

He curls his fingers in a fist and closes his eyes as his lower jaw begins to ache. It’s an ache he has felt a lot recently. The deep, physical urge to cry.

He can still be tempted.

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Their first coupling since the ride in the airship is furious, obscene and brutally quick in the backseat of Ardyn’s car. It makes Ignis feel like a whore, but he is a whore. Because for all these weeks he’d been sleeping with the enemy, ignoring every sign that something was off because he liked being fucked by an older, more powerful man.

Ignis tells him to shut up, again and again and again, and only after Ardyn suggests that he can fuck him _if he likes_ , does he actually obey.

He doesn’t expect to like it, because half of what makes sex with Ardyn _Izunia_ so intoxicating is the surrendering of control, the sheer depravity of the sacrifice of all of his responsibility. Ardyn devours his strength while simultaneously offering him something he’d never known he could possess, because beneath Ardyn Izunia he feels powerfully alive.

Ardyn runs his fingers through his hair, still damp with sweat, and asks him again when he pulls over, this time in the shadow of a cliff and far, far from the road, far from anyone who might hear them scream. _Would you like to?_

He’s already desperate, hungry for his cock again but also _unfathomably_ longing to be in his arms. _I still adore you. I still…._ His lower jaw aches still, and he can feel the crust of salt on his cheeks from his earlier tears.

“Will you do it if I order you to?”

He leans into the hand stroking his chin, presses his lips to Ardyn’s palm and mouths an affirmative.

“Then fuck me, Ignis Scientia. I _command_ it.” 

-

Ardyn, Ardyn. Ardyn. Something about this man gives him so much power while stripping away all agency he has. It enrages him as he pushes Ardyn, laughing _laughing_ , down in the back seat and tears at his belt. He’s hard, to be expected at this point, Ignis’ blood and come still rendering his pubic hair damp, and the younger man feels white-hot with rage at the sight.

And Ardyn does that _thing_ again, seemingly reading his mind. “You want this?” He waves a bottle of lubricant over his head.

“You didn’t use anything on me so no.”

“I think you’re going to regret that more than I will….” He all but sings it, the mockery clear in his eyes. There are a thousand things he could mean by that but Ignis doesn’t care to know, so he snatches the bottle from his fingers.

The position is torturous, but Ardyn’s hips are remarkably flexible and he’s obedient in his posture, even when Ignis pushes his knees flush to his shoulders and Ardyn twitches, kicking the car ceiling with a sigh as he’s entered. And the entire time, Ardyn taunts him, laughs and goads him on, pushes him around until Ignis is hitting him just the way he likes, and it makes Ignis writhe with fury and _need_. He still wants to be controlled, still craves the power this man at once gives and deprives him of.

When it’s over, he’s crying again. He’s cried more in the last six weeks than he has in the last 16 years, cried more because of _Ardyn_ than because his family and king were murdered. Murdered because of the emperor this man knelt for. Ardyn had sworn that he had no real military power, that he’d advised against the invasion again and again, and yet. Yet he kept his secrets. _What were you thinking of, every time we fucked, every time you texted me, every time you bought me gifts and taught me new elemancy skills and discussed obscure lore with me and encouraged me while I_ adored _you?_ It hurts beyond measure, and _yet we are still together_. His fingers close around the older man’s throat, holding him still. He slaps him with all the strength of the heart on his sleeve he has so unfortunately bore to the man beneath him. “I wanted to trust you.”

The look in Ardyn’s eyes as he snarls at him is enough to make Ignis tremble in fear and need, and he silently dares the older man to consume him whole.

-

Ardyn ravages him almost the moment he steps into the shower naked, and it’s only as Ignis expects. Fast, savage sex that will leave bruises over half his body for days, sex that would have been painful and bloody were it not for the fact that he was still stretched and dripping come from their earlier fuck. Still, Ardyn makes him scream in ecstasy and pain and _rage_ while he tears at the sheets and longs for oblivion.

When it’s over, Ignis pushes him off without a word and stumbles into the bathroom. He showers again for scarcely a minute, only lingering long enough to wash away the reek of sex before climbing into his clothes half-wet and leaning against the bathroom mirror, willing his heart to slow. Or stop. It might be for the best.

Because Ardyn’s last words to him as he climaxed linger, echoing again and again in his mind. _Your Majesty._

Ignis thanks him when he leaves, and he doesn’t want to reflect on why.

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Ardyn tries to make it up to him, again and again he tries, and again and again Ignis tries to resist, but his resolve weakens with every touch, every smile, every little favor and every whisper of praise sent in his direction. Because Ardyn is relentless in pursuing him, in seeking his favor again, so much so that Ignis ceases to believe he’d only been used. Ardyn’d find another way to get to the king by now, instead of chasing after him a spurned lover. Something about his apparent anguish over the situation excites Ignis. He’d spent the last month in awe that a man of his looks and intelligence would be attracted to him, but now to know that the enemy empire’s chancellor wanted him, to know that someone in such a position of power would suck his cock and obey his every command in bed, thrills him in a way he suspects is very inappropriate.

“Why must you remain so hurt over this?” Ardyn asks softly one evening while Ignis pointedly refuses to look at him, feet up on the dashboard as he scrolls through old texts on his phone. They’d gone on a demon hunt, their third since the incident on the airship, so that Ignis might practice the sagefire technique Ardyn had so recently taught him. “I kept it from you because I didn’t want it to become between us.”

“It didn’t _have_ to come between us,” he snaps back, cutting each word off with his teeth. He’d enjoyed himself more than he cares to admit. “But because you said nothing, now it has.”

“You’d still have gotten to know me, _slept with_ me, if you’d known who I was from the beginning?”

Only then does Ignis look at him, at the strong jawline he’s kissed a thousand times, the heavy-lidded golden eyes and the mouth perpetually twisted up in half a lazy smirk. Yes. _Gods, yes_ , he would have. “I might not have been so…forward. But yes.”

“Ah.”

Ignis chews on his lower lip, fighting the urge to reply. He wants to jab at him, to tease him for being at such a loss for words, because Ardyn is never at a loss for words. But no. He’s angry at him, and therefore unwilling to play.

“I suppose I underestimated your…”

“Promiscuity.”

“If that’s the way you’d like to put it.”

Ignis laughs then before he can stop himself. _Promiscuous_. He’s certain his friends would never even consider the term when it came to him, not in a thousand ages, yet here he sits in the car of the Niflheim Chancellor, the car that they’ve had sex in no less than seven times in the last couple of weeks. Because since that first frenzied fuck in the backseat, Ignis had discovered the thrill of coupling in places other than expensive beds in still more expensive hotels. It’s only fitting, after all, that they resort to the backseats of cars now, to caravans and cheap motels and, once, a restaurant bathroom, because he’s _nothing but a common whore_.

-

Another evening, another eternity spent with Ardyn Izunia. Ignis’ friends had grown so used to his excursions that they scarcely noticed when he ducked off for a few hours after a furtive glance at his phone. They never commented on whatever unusual treasures or ingredients or books he returned with, whatever new spells he learned, though more than once Gladio gives him a look as if judging him. He must have realized by now that this mysterious older man was not only very wealthy but adept at magic and _always conveniently around_. If Ignis had ever wanted to tell him about the man who has swept him away, he certainly can’t do so now. Now that he’s the Niflheim Chancellor. Gladio had been right to be wary, but for all the wrong reasons.

The caravan bed is small, too small, the room stuffy and hot, but Ignis makes no effort to extricate himself from Ardyn’s coat lying over him. He likes the weight of it, the smell of the older man’s cologne that has long since passed from intriguing to erotic to comforting. Even after everything. Ardyn had taken him to see the elusive Elder Coeurl, a beast he’d been obsessed with as a child, and the thrill he’d received had been so much that he feels exhausted now. It shouldn’t matter, but the older man remembering such small details of their past conversations satisfies him.

Ardyn, now leaning against the counter and finishing a cup of ebony. He’s pulled his hair back, something he rarely does despite Ignis’ repeated suggestions _. You think putting so much gel in your hair that it appears you’ve run into a wall is a wise fashion decision, so keep it to yourself._ Ignis misses the sharpness of his tongue, now somewhat diminished, but he’s too tired now to push him.

Ardyn, now folding his long legs up and slouching on the bed beside him, leaning against the headboard and draping an arm around Ignis’ shoulders.

“Good evening, _Chancellor Ardyn_.” Maybe he isn’t so tired. He slides over, makes room for him and lets the coat fall to the floor.

He doesn’t rise to the bait though, only wags his finger and tuts softly. “Chancellor _Izunia_ is the proper title.”

Ignis settles into the weight and the warmth beside him and frowns, somehow put off. He vaguely recalls an earlier conversation, one in the lifetime before he knew Ardyn’s position, but it’s just beyond the edges of his memory, blurred out of focus as if in his peripheral vision. _The name._ The name eats at him. He isn’t used to his memory failing him. Probably only something he read once upon a time; he shakes his head once as if to rid himself of it and the older man takes that as an invitation to continue.

“As I’ve told you,” he rubs his thumb up the inside of Ignis’ arm, his voice barely a whisper as he follows his artery, “my position as Niflheim Chancellor is quite limited due to Aldercapt being an idiot, but did you know that the Chancellor under normal circumstances is equivalent to the position the Lucians call the General to the King? That’s your future, is it not?”

 _Don’t bring this up, not now. Why must you bring this up?_ But he knows why. Ardyn _Izunia_ , the only man who has ever taken his ambition seriously, who hasn’t gently chided him that the position is no more, that even if it existed, it was not meant for him, a mere retainer. Ardyn _Izunia_ , the one man who sees his ambition for what it truly is, _loyalty_ , and respects and admires him for it. Ardyn _Izunia_ , now leaning against him, so close their foreheads touch as they exchange sighs.

“Do you think I would have trained you as I have if I truly supported the emperor? Why would I assist my…future adversary? Because you will be my equal one day. If you so desire.”

Ignis tilts his face upwards and opens his mouth, kisses him in acquiescence even as Ardyn murmurs the next words into his lips. 

_If you stay with me._

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“This is too expensive,” he balks, stepping back from the counter. 30000 gil a _night_? That much money would buy a month at a regular inn. When Ardyn had whispered what he’d wanted to do to him tonight, Ignis had all but moaned in need right on the streets of Altissia; he’d agreed to the meeting several hours hence, but he hadn’t considered that Ardyn might take him _here_. The restaurant had been horrifyingly expensive enough, though that very expense is what ensured their privacy.

“Oh, Ignis. If only you knew how much some of those spell ingredients I’ve bought for you cost…” He smirks, eyes half-closed and knowing. “Actually. No. Better not.”

He pales and worries his lower lip. He’d always refused the larger gifts, the permanent gifts. New daggers, fine clothing, even jewelry, but he’d greedily accepted everything else, items that were used, absorbed, dispersed, items that could be forgotten because their presence did not linger in his vision. It had never crossed his mind that those smaller things might have cost a small fortune, and it unnerves him that such a thing never occurred to him. _Why do I act like such a fool around him?_

But Ardyn has already paid, and Ignis allows himself to be pushed off towards the elevator.

-

“Forgive me,” he murmurs against his lips. It’s the first time Ardyn has ever apologized for anything, much less _that_.

 _I don’t know if I can._ But he can’t bring the words forth, not with Ardyn curling those skilled fingers inside of him, and he only arches his back and sighs in response.

Ardyn takes him slow, agonizingly, torturously, tantalizingly slow, and somehow it makes Ignis burn all the more. He tangles fingers in auburn hair and lays the older man’s head against his shoulder, and he feels the dam holding back his affection these last few weeks begin to crack. It’s been a long time since they’ve had sex like this. _Ardyn, the burning one. Ignis aflame._ He forgets the fact that he’d preferred it dirty lately, couplings in motels and cars and restaurant bathrooms with increasingly depraved acts since he discovered who Ardyn was. He forgets that he’d wanted so desperately to make it clear that they were only together for fucking, that that was all that mattered. A clinical, businesslike relationship. He is ready to move past that, to make a return. He wonders if he is ready to forgive.

He’s close, agonizingly close, but it isn’t enough. Because the promise Ardyn had lured him in with was the promise of a climax untouched. _I will make you see the stars without touching you_. But now Ignis understands why they’d never had the patience for it before now. The stimulation isn’t enough without Ardyn’s calloused hands pulling him to completion.

Please please _please_ touch me. He whines.

“No. It’ll be better this way. It will be. Divine.” He bites him then, sharp and unexpected. “ _I am divinity inside of you_.”

And Ignis almost remembers something, almost. But the epiphany flitting by the corners of his vision is gone as Ardyn growls something hoarse and low against his throat. _I will devour you_. Ignis cries out as the fire consumes his veins.

-

Ardyn Izunia immediately after sex is devastatingly attractive, and as Ignis props himself up on the pillows and traces slow circles over Ardyn’s chest, he is reminded of the first time he’d looked at the older man, half-asleep and half-tangled in the sheets, content and sated. His marvel now is as it had been that first night, and suddenly he wants to tell him, _needs_ to tell him, those words that have been hovering at the back of his throat for an eternity now.

“Ardyn,” he whispers, once and then twice.

The older man cracks an amber eye open and smiles from one corner of his mouth. “ _Ignis_.”

“I need to tell you something.” He can’t contain the urgency in his voice and he isn’t sure why. “I—”

Ardyn looks amused at this, but still he presses a finger to his lips and shushes him. “Tell me after the speech tomorrow, after the first stone of the path to peace has been placed. Don’t want to jinx things now, do we?”

“But I want—”

He kisses him this time to silence him. “I know, Ignis Scientia, I know. I _want_ , too.”

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“What do you say?”

Nothing. There are no words for this level of betrayal. Ardyn, standing before him now with dark magic shrouding his arms. Ardyn, having just calmly, mockingly threatened to kill Noctis after ordering Magitek soldiers to take Ignis down.

 _It was my fault. I brought him down upon us._ He knows that Ardyn has been circling them as a vulture does for some time, some dangerously long time, but that does not alter his despair. _I was the one who fell for him, who encouraged him, who made everything easier for him. I was supposed to be the intelligent one, the wary strategist, and I turned a blind eye to sanity in his arms._ Even after he knew who he was, if he even is who he claims to be, he slept with him. He’d all too willingly believed the lies that Ardyn had nothing to do with the war, that he’d actively resisted it, that the emperor had stripped him of much of his political power to ensure he wouldn’t get in the way. It had seemed suspicious, but Ignis wanted to believe it. Because Ardyn pursued him and exalted him, praising him at every turn and giving him all he’d ever wanted, but been unable to ask the gods for. And because most of all, Ignis had _liked_ him. More than liked him.

He remembers a hundred times he’s lain beneath this main, knowingly sating himself on deceit.

And he remembers a hundred conversations, a thousand offhand comments he’d so carefully ignored, only now revealing another man and another story.

_The people who sacrifice the most are often the ones the Crystal overlooks._

The Crystal overlooked no one. It can only ever be Noctis. His friend, his brother, his _king_.

_I don’t like how you’ve been deprived your freedom by virtue of the royal line._

But Ignis is deprived of nothing. He knows this now, knows that the honesty laid bare and brutal in his relationship with Noctis – adviser, retainer, _servant_ – is far more of a freedom than the lies of Ardyn Izunia. He raises the Ring of Lucis, the trembling in his limbs stilled not in in the calm that comes with not only loyalty and fidelity, but the deepest of rage and despair. And _spite_. He puts on the ring.

And destiny bends to his will.

-

The ring burns, the fire of a thousand suns sparking its way up his arm, his throat, encircling his torso and exploding across his face. The world fractures, bends, shatters around him as darkness enshrouds him, a darkness like none he has ever experienced before, one that draws shades over the insides of his eyes in such a way that he feels the oppressive nature of it. Blind. He’s blind.

But he is also blind to the permanence of it, because he believes it is only the ring’s power, because he is certain he will die within the hour, and because all he cares for now is Ardyn. _Killing_ Ardyn. He’s never wanted to kill anyone before.

“Well.” And Ardyn is in front of him, a wave of heat and wrath suddenly before him. Ignis shudders, but he doesn’t turn away, not even when Ardyn leans in, close enough that Ignis’ muscle memory longs to tilt his face up and kiss him, not even when he snarls, “They’ve shown you their favor after all.”

 _If they’d shown me their favor, I never would have known you._ But he can’t speak, too white-hot with anguish he is. Because even without sight, he knows Ardyn just moved in a way that only a Lucis Caelum can move. Another lie, another betrayal. Something is slowly beginning to crystalize in his mind.

Ignis can’t see, but the power of the ring has granted him the ability to sense light, and therefore its absence, and Ardyn is a yawning void even in the oncoming night. He is an absence so great that his darkness has taken shape, and even as Ignis begins to understand that Ardyn _is not human_ , he recognizes the cruelty. There will forever be an absence in him now, an absence so severe it will take form beneath his ribcage and linger in his veins forever.

If the ring kills him, he will be relieved. _I won’t have to live knowing what I’ve done._ It’s selfish, but Ignis has always had a selfish side, reckless and emotional. _I won’t have to live being unworthy to protect the king._ Because who was he to make such a grievous error? _I won’t have to live with my heart torn asunder_. Because for all his fury, he yearns. He wants to reach out, clutch Ardyn’s shoulders and ask him why. Even as he knows what has transpired is unforgiveable, he wants to, _needs to_ , understand. 

And Ardyn makes it even worse, dodging his daggers and occasionally lashing out but refusing to draw weapons, to use magic, to harm him. He knocks him down a few times, but the one time Ignis stumbles and falls on his own, Ardyn is there, grabbing his shoulder and bodily hoisting him up. _Don’t hurt yourself now_ , a growl in his ear so low that Ignis prayed to the gods he hadn’t heard it.

There is almost a sense of relief when he feels the power begin to drain from him, feels the burning subside and his strength falter. He can still sense light, and therefore the void, but he knows now it is coming to an end. He might again be consumed, embraced, devoured, by something eternal, but at least the oblivion of death shall not hurt in the way grief does.

Still he reaches once more for the abyss before him. _I loved you, I loved you, I_ love _you._

And then there is nothing.

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It was Prompto who unexpectedly suggested it. _The three of us should go out, just down to the food trucks. It’d be good for Ignis to be out._ Prompto. Too gentle for this world. He can’t recall where he heard it, but it suits him. Prompto, now gently guiding him to the car, a hand on his back and a hand on his arm. Ignis can just picture his nervous, concerned expression. It’s the best he can do, the best he will ever do now.

The younger man had offered to drive, an offer met with a synchronized and resounding _no_ from Ignis and Gladio, and so he sits in the backseat. Ignis knows he prefers the front, knows he gets carsick easily and even if he _doesn’t_ , his anxiety over the possibility irritates everyone else until seats are redistributed. But he also knows that Prompto will steadfastedly sit beside him, ensuring he doesn’t need anything, and there is no point in discussing it further.

“Gladio, is this yours?”

“Hm?” Ignis hears the creaking of the leather seat as he turns in his seat. _How I will miss his face._ Once Gladio had taken his hands in his, encouraged him to feel his face, read his expression and preserve the memory in his fingertips, but every touch from another human makes Ignis ache in a way he can’t come to terms with, and so he’d drawn back, asked him quietly not to do that again. He didn’t need any of his senses to imagine the pain on Gladio’s face that day.

“A book in the backseat here. I don’t want to be seen with a romance novel,” He smiles absently, but the joke falls false even on his ears. It will be difficult to tease Gladio about what he reads now.

But Gladio laughs that low laugh of his, more of a huff than anything else. “Nope. Probably something you let someone borrow and whoever it was figured it was easier to leave it there than try to get past Claustra’s guards.” Because Secretary Claustra had offered them a guard detail to ensure no one got close to Noctis and Ignis while recovering. She’s insisted, and Gladio had unexpectedly stepped aside.

He sighs, jogs the book in his hand and tries to get a sense of what it might be based on its heft, the material of the cover. “What is it? I don’t remember…”

Another creak as Gladio leans over. “ _The Heroogony_? Looks really old.”

“That isn’t mine. It must be a mistake.” But as he turns the book over, runs his fingers down its spine, he knows it is not a mistake. _Ignis_. Cut with a knife in the lower left corner. He opens it, still half expecting to be able to see yet startled to realize that he can. Almost.

The font is raised. Every trace of ink, despite the book seeming old, has been elevated so that he can feel the words.

“Ah, actually it isn’t a mistake,” he says softly.

“So it’s yours? Hey is that—”  Prompto leans over now and Ignis gently reaches over, grabs up his arm until he finds his shoulder and pushes him back.

“Please drive, Gladio.”

Gladio grunts, and Ignis can imagine the look exchanged between him and Prompto. He is grateful for his friends’ predictability, though, because neither of them say a word as the car starts up and Ignis hears the telltale sounds of Prompto playing with his camera. He can imagine the younger man glancing at him occasionally, but now, finally, he has something to distract himself from this newfound darkness, from his slumbering king, from that strange wound he senses deep within him, a hiraeth he cannot remember ever feeling before.

The book is an old history of Lucis, stories he has heard a hundred times, yet still the very act of reading, even if it is so different, much slower, and more difficult than what he is used to, comforts him.

Until the third chapter, when his fingers reveal a story at once familiar and _other_. He reads of the First King of Lucis, who was not truly the First King. Because that title belonged to a healer, a sage who saved the world from a hideous plague only to be deemed unclean by the Crystal, usurped and executed so that his brother might reign. _But he did not die, for three days hence a whisper arose among the people of the crown city. He had arisen again as Izunia, eternal, anathema, and accursed, and from this day forth exists as a scourge to the earth._

Izunia.

The body recalls what the mind has lost and as his fingers trace over the raised word again and again, he _trembles in awe_.

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End file.
